The Eastern District of Wisconsin local rules supplement the Federal Rules of Civil and Criminal Procedure and are organized into General, Civil, and Criminal parts, with admiralty and maritime matters folded into the Civil Rules rather than treated separately.1United States District Court. Are There Rules I Have to Follow, and Where Can I Find Them?2United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal Small procedural mistakes under these rules regularly cost filers rejected documents, missed deadlines, or sanctions, so knowing where the rules sit and what each key one requires is the first step before filing anything.
Where to Read the Current Version
The court publishes the Local Rules on its official website at wied.uscourts.gov. Check the effective date on the document you download, because the court amends the rules periodically and third-party copies go stale. The rules are not the only instructions that bind you: individual judges publish their own standing orders and chambers procedures, and those apply on top of the Local Rules.
Attorney Admission and No Pro Hac Vice
Only attorneys admitted to the court’s bar may file in this district. Any licensed attorney in good standing before a United States court or the highest court of any state is eligible.3United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – General L.R. 83(c) The application requires the court’s admission form, a prescribed oath taken before a notary or other authorized officer, and either a certificate of good standing dated within the last 90 days or an affidavit from an attorney already admitted here.4United States District Court. Attorney Admission
The Eastern District of Wisconsin does not permit pro hac vice motions.5United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – General L.R. 83(c)(2)(E) An out-of-state attorney who needs to appear in a single case must apply for full admission. The only exceptions are federal government attorneys authorized by statute to appear in any district court, and attorneys in multi-district litigation cases, who receive limited admission tied to that specific case. After admission, attorneys register for electronic filing through PACER, and the individual PACER login serves as the attorney’s electronic signature for purposes of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11.4United States District Court. Attorney Admission
Filing Fee
A new civil action costs $405, which includes a $55 administrative fee. The administrative fee does not apply to habeas corpus petitions or to parties granted in forma pauperis status under 28 U.S.C. § 1915.6United States District Court. District Court Fee Schedule Pro se litigants who cannot afford the fee may ask the court for leave to proceed without paying it, subject to court review.
How Documents Must Look
General Local Rule 5(a) sets formatting standards that are simple but strictly enforced.7United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – General L.R. 5(a)
- Paper size 8½ by 11 inches.
- Margins of at least one inch on all four sides; page numbers may sit in the margin, nothing else.
- Double-spaced body text. Quotations longer than two lines may be indented and single-spaced. Headings and footnotes may be single-spaced.
- Proportionally spaced fonts must be 12-point or larger and include serifs. Sans-serif is allowed only in headings and captions. Monospaced fonts may not exceed 10½ characters per inch.
- Plain roman style. Italics or boldface for emphasis only. Case names must be italicized or underlined.
The first page of every filing needs a caption with the court’s name, the parties’ names, the case number, and a title identifying the document. A missing or wrong element in the caption is one of the fastest ways to draw a clerk’s rejection.
Electronic Filing and Service
Filings go through CM/ECF as PDFs uploaded directly to the docket. The system generates a Notice of Electronic Filing and sends it to every registered party, and that notice serves as proof of service for anyone registered, so no separate certificate of service is required for electronic filings.8United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – Civil L.R. 5 Pro se litigants not registered for electronic filing submit paper documents to the Clerk’s Office in person or by mail. The system stamps the exact date and time of receipt, so deadline compliance is not a judgment call.
Motion Deadlines and Page Limits
Civil Local Rule 7 governs the timeline. The nonmoving party has 21 days to respond, and the moving party has 14 days after the response to file a reply.9United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – Civil L.R. 7(b)-(c) Summary judgment motions and expedited non-dispositive motions run on their own schedules.
Principal briefs (supporting or opposing) cannot exceed 30 pages. Reply briefs cannot exceed 15. Captions, tables of contents, tables of authorities, and signature blocks are excluded from the count.10United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – Civil L.R. 7(f) Extra pages require leave of court in advance.
Summary Judgment: The Numbered Fact Statement
Civil Local Rule 56 layers a specific structure on top of Rule 56 of the Federal Rules. The moving party must file a numbered list of proposed material facts, one fact per numbered paragraph, each with a specific citation to record evidence.11United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – Civil L.R. 56(b)
The opposing party has 30 days from service to respond, and the response must reproduce each numbered paragraph and answer it individually, citing evidence for any disagreement. The opposition may also add its own numbered paragraphs of additional facts said to require denying the motion. Vague objections without specific evidence are where oppositions typically fall apart. The 30-page principal and 15-page reply limits apply to summary judgment memoranda.12United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – Civil L.R. 56(b)(8)
Discovery Caps and the Duty to Confer
Each party may serve no more than 25 written interrogatories, and using subparts to evade that cap is explicitly prohibited. Questions about witness names and locations, or the existence and location of documents, do not count toward the 25. Requests for admission are capped at 50, with a similar exclusion for requests about the genuineness of documents.13United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – Civil L.R. 36(a)
Before any motion to compel, Civil Local Rule 37 requires a written certification that you conferred, or tried to confer, in good faith with the other side, including the date, time, and participants of each attempt.14United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – Civil L.R. 37 Skip that certification and expect the motion to be denied.
Sealing and Restricting Documents
Every filing is public unless you affirmatively restrict it. Under General Local Rule 79(d), a separate motion to seal or restrict must be filed before the sealed document itself. A document filed as sealed or restricted without an accompanying motion will be made public.15United States District Court. Filing Restricted and Sealed Documents
Sealed documents are visible only to the judge. The filing attorney cannot view them through PACER after filing and must serve opposing counsel with a paper copy. When only part of a document is confidential, the court expects a redacted public version with the unredacted portion filed as a sealed attachment, not a wholesale seal of the entire document.15United States District Court. Filing Restricted and Sealed Documents The motion to seal must also certify that the parties conferred in good faith to try to avoid or narrow the request.16United States District Court. Local Rules General, Civil, and Criminal – General L.R. 79(d)(4)
Magistrate Judge Consent
New civil cases are randomly assigned to either a district judge or a magistrate judge. Each party receives a consent form early in the case and must indicate within 21 days whether it agrees to have a magistrate judge handle the entire case, including trial and final judgment.17United States District Court. Consent-Refusal to Proceed Before Magistrate Judge
If a case sits with a district judge and all parties consent, the district judge may transfer it to a magistrate judge. If a case is with a magistrate judge and any party declines, the case is randomly reassigned to a district judge. The consent itself is voluntary, but returning the form is not.17United States District Court. Consent-Refusal to Proceed Before Magistrate Judge
Divisions and Mediation, Briefly
The district operates two divisions, Milwaukee and Green Bay, and the correct filing location depends on the county where the dispute originates.18United States District Court. Eastern District of Wisconsin19United States Department of Justice. About the District Mediation is available but not mandatory; parties who want it can ask the presiding judge to refer the case to a magistrate judge for that limited purpose.20United States District Court. Mediation
Check Your Judge’s Standing Orders Before Anything Else
Every judge in the district publishes individual standing orders and chambers procedures. These supplement the Local Rules and can cover trial exhibit organization, scheduling conference expectations, and informal protocols for discovery disputes. The court’s website links to each judge’s procedures.21United States District Court. Judges by Seniority
Some judges require paper courtesy copies of lengthy filings delivered to chambers. Others require an informal step before any discovery motion. Violating a standing order can produce sanctions or stricken filings. The Local Rules describe what the court expects generally. Your judge’s standing orders describe what the case in front of you will actually require, so read them before drafting.